Quotations from Speaker Newt Gingrich: on Welfare & Poverty


Lyndon Johnson: OpEd: Legacy of Great Society is red tape & deficits

In my lifetime, without question, the President who lied the most and did the most damage to the United States was Lyndon Johnson. It was Johnson who misled the American people about war in Asia. It was Johnson who designed a disastrous economic policy that fueled the inflation from which we are only now recovering. It was Johnson's politics of irresponsible promises which led to riots on the campuses and in the cities. It was Johnson's "Great Society" which is smothering us in red tape, fiscal deficits and massive bureaucracy.
--Newt Gingrich Speech, "The survival of the Two-Party System" (Ingram Library, West Georgia College) 1976
Source: Quotations from Speaker Newt, by A.&P. Bernstein, p. 82-3 Jan 1, 1995

Newt Gingrich: Change America one church & one organization at a time

We're not going to change America in Washington D.C. We're going to change America one individual at a time, one family at a time, one neighborhood at a time, one church or synagogue at a time, one voluntary organization at a time, one private business at a time, and then one local government, one school board, one city council, one state legislature. And yeah, the Congress and the President are going to have a role to play in all this.
--Speech at the Capitol, Washington D.C. December 5, 1994
Source: Quotations from Speaker Newt, by A.&P. Bernstein, p.113 Jan 1, 1995

Newt Gingrich: Tell the poor the truth: to be middle class is to work hard

We don't tell the poor the truth, which is, to be middle class is to work hard. To be middle class is to do a lot of things you don't want to do. And yet the rewards, the ability to live a decent life, to plan your career, to send your kids to school, to go on a nice vacation, to have a decent home, those rewards are paid for by hard work, and there is no shortcut.
--Renewing American Civilization, Class 2

Show me a wagon train that had food stamps. Show me a wagon train that had able bodied adults who were not working. Show me a wagon train that dealt with its criminals while allowing them to wander around committing new crimes. Show me a wagon train that taxed the productive in order to subsidize people who did not want to do a day's work.
--Referring to N.Y. Governor Mario Cuomo's 1984 DNC Convention Speech

When the welfare state finds reasons to excuse people from personal strength, it begins the process of destroying them.
--Renewing American Civilization, Class 2

Source: Quotations from Speaker Newt, by A.&P. Bernstein, p.114-5 Jan 1, 1995

  • The above quotations are from Quotations from Speaker Newt
    The Little Red, White and Blue Book of the Republican Revolution

    by Newt Gingrich and Amy D. Bernstein.
  • Click here for definitions & background information on Welfare & Poverty.
  • Click here for other issues (main summary page).
  • Click here for more quotes by Newt Gingrich on Welfare & Poverty.
  • Click here for more quotes by Ronald Reagan on Welfare & Poverty.
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Page last updated: Feb 24, 2019